patrick.net

ThreeBays says

If you had to say, slow innovation by 10% in order to make it's cost sustainable then we should. Actually, it's not we should... we will have to. The US simply can't afford the rate of healthcare cost increases.

In a competitive free market place, Innovation is what drives down prices. The rapid rise of healthcare cost in the US is not due to innovation but due to government sanctioned and subsidized monopolies. How much innovation is in a $35 Tylenol pill in an emergency room? It doesn't even have a 3-cent RFID sticker on it, like most items priced over $10 do at Walmart.

ThreeBays says

the US has lower life expectancy than a dozen countries that have national health care).

Life expectancy statistic is largely determined by infant mortality nowadays. Countries like Cuba don't count a newborn as a person until the most risky first 10 months have passed. Many western European countries like UK, France and Germany have higher elective abortion rates than the US; that means their parents tend to redo when faced with a child with congenital problems that would lead to high infant mortality instead of counting on NICU like parents tend to do here in the US.

ThreeBays says

There is no free lunch. There are a finite amount of resources on Earth. The more we sink into never ending healthcare "innovation", the more we have to take away from other "healthy" things, like not being broke and depressed, eating good food, or vacationing or retirement.

Depending on what kind of research. In a competitive free market, corporations maximize profit by offering better value to customers in order to attract more customers. In a monopolistic market with massive government subsidy, the monopolists maximize profit by restricting supply and maximize payment from government.

Reality says

Wealth disparity is the result of market power if you blame market for creating disparity. If you want to ascribe wealth and power disparity to political power, then you and I are in agreement.

Perhaps. But my question was how does the free market reduce inequality? When has that happened?

Reality says

Social Security spending alone now is larger than military spending, so the latter can not possibly be 50% of government spending.

I was looking at the budget--Social Security is a trust fund and off-budget.

Reality says

After the S&L crisis of the 1980's, the first massive bailout was the early 1990's Mexican debt default and Argetine default (FED and the US government using Mexico and Argentine as device for funneling taxpayer money to major US banks that have lent too much money to those countries); then Russian default of in 1997, same scam; then 1998 "Asian contagion," same scam; then NASDAQ bubble and burst of 2000, the bailout of which led to the housing boom and bust of 2003-present.

It astounds me that you can attribute every bad decision made by the free market to the Federal Reserve.

bgamall4 says

Screw the UK, all that is left for regular people are boxes!

Finally, the cat master plan is coming to fruition. First they take over the Internet, then they impose their culture upon the human population. Soon, all humans will live like cats, act like cats, and submit to the supremacy of the feline culture. Resistance is futile!

Reality says

the government telling you that you have no choice but to deal with Koch brothers for oil and Warren Buffet for hamburgers, sugary soda water and insurance for the medical consequences of consuming the junk food that he is selling.

Why do you always make it one extreme vs. the other extreme? Isn't it possible to have a capitalist society with a strongly progressive tax system and tightly regulated?

The answer, of course, is yes. The US did it before Reagan and things worked quite well.

tatupu70 says

Why do you always make it one extreme vs. the other extreme? Isn't it possible to have a capitalist society with a strongly progressive tax system and tightly regulated?

The answer, of course, is yes. The US did it before Reagan and things worked quite well.

That must be why Carter lost in a landslide, that the US was doing so well before Reagan! LOL. The socialist brain is a wasteland taken over by amnesia. That's why they always insist on repeating the same mistakes that's been done over and over again in human history.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

Wealth disparity is the result of market power if you blame market for creating disparity. If you want to ascribe wealth and power disparity to political power, then you and I are in agreement.

Perhaps. But my question was how does the free market reduce inequality? When has that happened?

It happens every single time when someone buys goods and services from an upstart instead of from an "IBM." Private individuals do that far more frequently than government bureaucrats do! The risk/reward matrix is different for the two. The private individual reaps all the financial savings when the less substitute works out, the bureaucrat gets nothing when the substitute works out but would lose his job if it doesn't. That's why tax-and-spend is a quick way to market concentration! In 1982, all tax money spent on purchasing PC's would have gone to IBM, very little would have gone to the upstart called Compaq . . . whereas private business owners were the primary buyers of Compaq to save a thousand or so (when PC's cost $5k-10k). Tax-and-spend is how the medical system, the education system and the military industrial complex are working under. They are the most wasteful segments of our economy with some of the greatest market concentration in each market.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

Social Security spending alone now is larger than military spending, so the latter can not possibly be 50% of government spending.

I was looking at the budget--Social Security is a trust fund and off-budget.

The "trust fund" is a fraud. Like I suspected, you are just talking nonsense by drawing artificial lines that don't exist. Government spending is government spending.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

After the S&L crisis of the 1980's, the first massive bailout was the early 1990's Mexican debt default and Argetine default (FED and the US government using Mexico and Argentine as device for funneling taxpayer money to major US banks that have lent too much money to those countries); then Russian default of in 1997, same scam; then 1998 "Asian contagion," same scam; then NASDAQ bubble and burst of 2000, the bailout of which led to the housing boom and bust of 2003-present.

It astounds me that you can attribute every bad decision made by the free market to the Federal Reserve.

The existence of the central bank standing at the ready to bailout bad bets made by the big boys is the reason why they felt free to make those bets. You may be naive, the banksters are not.

Reality says

That must be why Carter lost in a landslide, that the US was doing so well before Reagan! LOL. The socialist brain is a wasteland taken over by amnesia. That's why they always insist on repeating the same mistakes that's been done over and over again in human history.

lol--your logic is impeccible as usual. How about you look at the 3 decades after WWII objectively. One President certainly does not trump 30 years worth of data.

Unless you are being disingenuous, of course.

Reality says

It happens every single time when someone buys goods and services from an upstart instead of from an "IBM." Private individuals do that far more frequently than government bureaucrats do! The risk/reward matrix is different for the two. The private individual reaps all the financial savings when the less substitute works out, the bureaucrat gets nothing when the substitute works out but would lose his job if it doesn't. That's why tax-and-spend is a quick way to market concentration! In 1982, all tax money spent on purchasing PC's would have gone to IBM, very little would have gone to the upstart called Compaq . . . whereas private business owners were the primary buyers of Compaq to save a thousand or so (when PC's cost $5k-10k). Tax-and-spend is how the medical system, the education system and the military industrial complex are working under. They are the most wasteful segments of our economy with some of the greatest market concentration in each market.

See, here's the thing. We can measure inequality. If your hypothesis was true, then you could easily see it in the data. As you are unwilling or unable to post the actual inequality data, I'm concluding that your theories are incorrect.

Reality says

The "trust fund" is a fraud. Like I suspected, you are just talking nonsense by drawing artificial lines that don't exist. Government spending is government spending.

OK--whatever you say.

http://www.ssa.gov/history/BudgetTreatment.html

Reality says

The existence of the central bank standing at the ready to bailout bad bets made by the big boys is the reason why they felt free to make those bets. You may be naive, the banksters are not.

Ah, the old moral hazard argument again. Banks don't care if they lose 99% of their assets as long as they don't go bankrupt, right? How naive of me.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

That must be why Carter lost in a landslide, that the US was doing so well before Reagan! LOL. The socialist brain is a wasteland taken over by amnesia. That's why they always insist on repeating the same mistakes that's been done over and over again in human history.

lol--your logic is impeccible as usual. How about you look at the 3 decades after WWII objectively. One President certainly does not trump 30 years worth of data.

Unless you are being disingenuous, of course.

How good was it under Johnson or Nixon or Ford?
The one and half decade after WWII was due to exceptional circumstances: the rest of the world had their industrial capacity largely destroyed! Even JFK in the early 1960's started to realize the need to reduce taxes and jump start our economic competitiveness as the rest of the world recovered from WWII. Of course, the banksters preferred the War-and-Butter LBJ instead in order to rack up government deficit, which is just another way of saying the banksters get a percentage cut on all societal production via government taxes collected to service government debt created out of thin air.

tatupu70 says

See, here's the thing. We can measure inequality. If your hypothesis was true, then you could easily see it in the data. As you are unwilling or unable to post the actual inequality data, I'm concluding that your theories are incorrect.

No, inequality is not measurable. Don't tell me for a moment you were equally valued on the dating market when you were 20 years old as a pretty girl of that age. What you can measure is nominal income and nominal asset, neither of which is true reflection of real power and wealth. If you don't believe me, try to go to a popular club, and see how much you have to pay to cut the line vs. a pretty girl of 20 years old just by showing up. The pretty 20yr old may have no nominal income or nominal asset, but she has enormous power over men.

Likewise, the Kims of North Korea and the soviet bosses may not have/had much nominal salary, but they have/had enormous power, including power over life vs. death of most of their countrymen. None of that show up in your obsession over inconsequential numbers. That's how the socialist paradise have nominally low inequality. In reality, the feudal privileges that the elites have in those societies are far greater than our elites have in a monetized economy: you can approach Koch brothers near their residence in NYC; whereas if you try the same to the Kims in Pyneong, you'd be shot in an instant on the spot.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

That must be why Carter lost in a landslide, that the US was doing so well before Reagan! LOL. The socialist brain is a wasteland taken over by amnesia. That's why they always insist on repeating the same mistakes that's been done over and over again in human history.

That's funnny. Typical right winger. Not sure itf this one is stupid as he portrays himselto be, or just a lying spreader of propaganda. MY guess is that even he knows that the inflation of the 70 was almost totally independent of the President's policies.

Who knows, its possible that he's even smart enough to understand that it was Carter who appointed Volker as Fed chair, who proceeded to tighten credit until inflation was stopped. When it was finally stopped, with interest rates at all time highs (prime rate over 20%) that set the stage for interest rates falling like a rock and the mother of all booms that Reagan was fortunate enough to preside over.

I'm guessing that even Reality (ironic name) can comprehend reality, he's simultaneously stupid enough to believe the lies he tells himself, like so many fox bot dimbulbs.

Carter was sort of the opposite of Bush. He would iniate long term policies to save the economy, even if in the short term they hurt him politically. COntrast that with GWBs giving the SS surplus to the rich in the form of tax cuts and spending precious capital and lives on a war that we didn't need to fight (but both policies made him look good or so he thought, in the short run).

Reality says

No, inequality is not measurable

I think that pretty much says it all.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

The existence of the central bank standing at the ready to bailout bad bets made by the big boys is the reason why they felt free to make those bets. You may be naive, the banksters are not.

Ah, the old moral hazard argument again. Banks don't care if they lose 99% of their assets as long as they don't go bankrupt, right? How naive of me.

Banks do not care or think or eat or talk. The banksters do. If you were a Lehman executive with $1B under management, gambling $50B on a coin flip against an executive managing also $1B at another big firm is highly profitable: if you win you get to collect $49B from the taxpayers even if your counterparty never had any hope of paying up $50B from his $1B account; if you lose, you go work for him and split his $50B profit ($49B of which being from taxpayers) with him. That's how central bank bailout works. Banks and corporations are only legal fictions operated by and for the benefit of specific individuals.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

No, inequality is not measurable

I think that pretty much says it all.

What you end up measuring is only a fraction of wealth and power for any individual. That fractional ratio changes dramatically depends on the personal circumstances as well as the social circumstances. The power and wealth of a middle aged millionare or billionare is in his asset holdings, but they are a tiny fraction of the 7 billion people in the world. The power and wealth of a pretty young thing is mostly in her looks. The power and wealth of someone living off social security is in that safety net. The power and wealth of a bureaucrat in a socialist economy is in his bureaucratic power.

Don't be blinded by a leaf and miss the forest.

Reality says

That's how the socialist paradise have nominally low inequality. In reality, the feudal privileges that the elites have in those societies are far greater than our elites have in a monetized economy: you can approach Koch brothers near their residence in NYC; whereas if you try the same to the Kims in Pyneong, you'd be shot in an instant on the spot.

I missed the part where someone is saying we need to be like North Korea.

marcus says

Reality says

That's how the socialist paradise have nominally low inequality. In reality, the feudal privileges that the elites have in those societies are far greater than our elites have in a monetized economy: you can approach Koch brothers near their residence in NYC; whereas if you try the same to the Kims in Pyneong, you'd be shot in an instant on the spot.

I missed the part where someone is saying we need to be like North Korea.

Many of your ilk are enamored by the low nominal "wealth disparity" in other countries. North Korea has one of the lowest nominal "wealth disparities"; the Kims officially don't own anything and have very little official salary. The non-monetized raw political power is their real wealth and power in those societies (and to a lesser degree in many socializing western countries). Free market economies just have more transparency, hence visible nominal "wealth disparity," which many fools are railing against, preferring jumping from the luke warm pot into the fire itself.

Reality says

Many of your ilk are enamored by the low nominal "wealth disparity" in other countries.

Yes. Did you see the in depth piece BBill posted about Norway the other day ?

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20110201/in-norway-start-ups-say-ja-to-socialism.html

Well worth reading. Not that you're looking to be better informed. You only want to learn things that support the lies you tell yourself and others.

If you do read it in it entirety, you will find that it doesn't totally diss the U.S>, and it's sure to inform you of some details even that you can incorporate in the somewhat limited prism through which you view reality.

I still get a kick out of that name.

marcus says

That's funnny. Typical right winger. Not sure itf this one is stupid as he portrays himselto be, or just a lying spreader of propaganda. MY guess is that even he knows that the inflation of the 70 was almost totally independent of the President's policies.

Notice, I did not blame Carter. Ironically, it was Tatupu70 who described Carter as one failure out of 3 post-WWII decades . . . whereas I pointed out the systematic failure showing up during LBJ, Nixon and Ford administrations. I pointed out the landslide defeat for incumbent in 1980 election because Tatupu70 claimed the US was doing so great before Reagan came to office as a result of that election.

marcus says

Reality says

Many of your ilk are enamored by the low nominal "wealth disparity" in other countries.

Yes. Did you see the in depth piece BBill posted about Norway the other day ?

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20110201/in-norway-start-ups-say-ja-to-socialism.html

Well worth reading. Not that you're looking to be better informed. You only want to learn things that support the lies you tell yourself and others.

If you do read it in it entirety, you will find that it doesn't totally diss the U.S>, and it's sure to inform you of some details even that you can incorporate in to your (through a prism) view of reality.

I still get a kick out of that name.

Typical propaganda piece for the gullible and mathematically inept. A 44 million company with only 150 employees paying the owner less than $200k (derived from 50+% tax and his total personal tax being just over $100k) . . . while blowing $100+k on a single party! Do we have a Dennis Koslowski- class tax avoider/evader here? Was the party thrown for his wife's birthday? and did it have vodka served from the penis of the ice sculpture David? Do we really want to look into under which name that Porsche is held? How can a person making only $100k after-tax afford a $100k car on top of other trappings of wealth?

The man is just pulling a "Warrent Buffet": praising socialistic tax system (probably benefiting from government spending) while avoiding paying taxes himself.

BTW, this story also illustrates my point about simple statistics fail to reflect the real wealth and power. If anyone is dumb enough to think this Norwegian man with 150 employees only has the power and wealth of a master plumber or dentist making $200k a year, he'd be a fool . . . yet that's how the statistical lie would say.

Reality says

Ironically, it was Tatupu70 who described Carter as one failure out of 3 post-WWII decades .

Really? Please link where I said that.

Reality says

I pointed out the landslide defeat for incumbent in 1980 election because Tatupu70 claimed the US was doing so great before Reagan came to office as a result of that election.

I was referring specifically to wealth/income disparity. Obviously foreign policy issues combined with a little inflation had something to do with Mr. Carter's defeat. But that does nothing to refute any of my points.

Reality says

What you end up measuring is only a fraction of wealth

No, you measure all of their wealth. Maybe not perfectly, but pretty close.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

Ironically, it was Tatupu70 who described Carter as one failure out of 3 post-WWII decades .

Really? Please link where I said that.

Your post# 185 "One President does not trump 30 years of data."

tatupu70 says

I was referring specifically to wealth/income disparity. Obviously foreign policy issues combined with a little inflation had something to do with Mr. Carter's defeat. But that does nothing to refute any of my points.

Don't you know that when it comes to presidential elections, "It's the economy, stupid!" Foreign policy success did not save Bush Sr. Carter's landslide defeat was due to "economic malaise" (granted not entirely his fault, as the root cause was started by FDR and the deterioration drastically accelearated by LBJ then Nixon)

tatupu70 says

Reality says

What you end up measuring is only a fraction of wealth

No, you measure all of their wealth. Maybe not perfectly, but pretty close.

Not even in the same ball park. The wealth and power of a pretty young thing (her beauty, including health and sociability) far outweighs her bank account balance (if there is any). The wealth and power of someone living off social security likewise is in the safety net not his/her bank accounts or other assets. The wealth and power of Obama ("the most powerful man in the free world") is not his $400k a year income. You'd be a fool to believe the silly incomplete statistics means much of anything approaching reality for the bulk of the world's population living under the thumbs of their multi-tiered bureaucratic overlords.

Reality says

Your post# 185 "One President does not trump 30 years of data."

How do you twist that into saying "Carter as one failure out of 2 Post WWII decades"? Do you think those two statements are the same?

Reality says

Don't you know that when it comes to presidential elections, "It's the economy, stupid!"

lol--I think that statement assumed that there weren't 52 American hostages held for 444 days. That might tend to trump some general rules.

Reality says

The wealth and power of a pretty young thing

Who is talking about power? I'm talking about wealth.

robcolorado says

I sense a lot of hate for Realtors on this website. It's subtle, like an undertone...but it's there. :p

Not all realtors. But there is a significant dislike for certain types of realtors, flippers, etc... Just people who are completely worthless middle men that lie, cheat, and steal their way into a position to screw others around them.

I don't think anyone likes the type of people who take advantage of others for personal gain.

Reality says

Not just Koch brothers, even Warren Buffet would have gone bankrupt in a free market correction (when the smaller guys deemed his judgement wrong, many smaller players) if not for the government bailout via fiat money.

Absolutely. Has been denied here many times, but the free market is so good at correcting that even an "oracle" needs a bailout and insider trade here and then from the Fed/gov to stay eternally wealthy.

Egads101,
Can you answer a landlording question? Do you own the houses in your own name (presumably not "The Oracle")? Or did you set up an LLC?
I can imagine benefits for your own name: access to lower interest rates for one.
But with an LLC, if the economy tanked and the values and rents dropped, you could let the LLC go bankrupt while your personal assets would be separate. Or if there were some lawsuit, this might offer protection.

Are taxes better for personal ownership or LLC? I imagine property taxes are the same, but there could be an income tax difference.

CA landlords; if you own the home in an LLC, can you sell the LLC instead of the house? Then the LLC still owns the house, so the prop 13 tax basis is still low. Does this work?

Thanks for any inputs.

It's a stepping stone job, bootcamp for evil bankers. Some eventually move to their dream job as Nazi camp prison guards.

bgamall4 says

Lol, Dan, that is cute!

tatupu70 says

Reality says

Your post# 185 "One President does not trump 30 years of data."

How do you twist that into saying "Carter as one failure out of 2 Post WWII decades"? Do you think those two statements are the same?

How did you twist "3 post-WWII decades" into "2 Post"?

"One President does not trump 3 decades of data" of course is the same as claiming Carter as the singular failure in the post-WWII 3 decades when I was saying things were bad before Reagan whereas you claim things were peachy except for Carter (the "One President").

tatupu70 says

Reality says

Don't you know that when it comes to presidential elections, "It's the economy, stupid!"

lol--I think that statement assumed that there weren't 52 American hostages held for 444 days. That might tend to trump some general rules.

The election was a landslide, not a close-run. The failure of the rescue attempt by the US government (while Ross Perot successfully rescued his company employees at the same time) was symptomatic of the decay that had been accelearated by LBJ's gun-and-butter program and made all the worse by Nixon, and then ineffective subsequent care-takers Ford and Carter.

tatupu70 says

Reality says

The wealth and power of a pretty young thing

Who is talking about power? I'm talking about wealth.

What is wealth but the power to get someone else to do things that you'd like done for you? The pretty young thing has plenty "asset."

APOCALYPSEFUCK is Comptroller says

FortWayne says

Some eventually move to their dream job as Nazi camp prison guards.

Well, it's better than having no career path, right?

They sure are goal oriented.

ThreeBays says

What does the government have to do with the $35 Tylenol pill?

In two ways:

1. Government licensing requirement for hospitals and medical practice licenses makes most areas in the country monopolized by one hospital, few practitioners . . . and no service price list.

2. Government subsidy on certain patients and requirement to treat all patients at emergency rooms force hospitals to think up ways to transfer cost via silly vehicles, like the $35 Tylenol pill.

The US has a free market place if ever there was one. Free as in "your money or your life" free.

Medicine is one of the most heavily regulated industries in the US, along with education and banking. As you can see how well the people are treated in those three industries, compared to other industries where free market competition is more dominant.

So let me get this straight, big corporations surely should be forced to pay more to their employees because they are so flush with cash, except for when the market conditions deteriorate, then they immediately need Fed assistance, in fact let's leave the fiat-printing switch in the on-position forever to prevent the market from ever deteriorating. Sounds like a good business model to me. Wait, but the CEOs and owners still take away way too much money, so let's somehow regulate that part as well. Looks like we arrived at central planning then ;)

Foreclosures are a result of falling prices, not the cause.

ThreeBays says

Do you think Medicare pays $35 for Tylenol? Medicare pays a lot less for services than private insurance, which is a lot less than what hospitals would like to charge.

That's the crux of cost-transferring. Hospitals can get away with it because most hospitals are geographical monopolies thanks to local zoning and licensing requirement.

mell says

I already said that companies without debt would have done fine and even welcomed the new opportunities.

Yes, I'm sure CEOs of other companies were sitting around praying for financial Armageddon because the resulting 50% unemployment would do wonders for their sales and profits.

mell says

Cool! What do I win if I'm picked? How about unlimited backstopping of my brokerage account with some freshly minted fiat? I have some big bets to make!

You realize that you'd be receiving LOANS, right? So, when you lose, you lose. You'd just have the opportunity to work the rest of your life to pay it back.

FortWayne says

robcolorado says

I sense a lot of hate for Realtors on this website. It's subtle, like an undertone...but it's there. :p

Not all realtors. But there is a significant dislike for certain types of realtors, flippers, etc... Just people who are completely worthless middle men that lie, cheat, and steal their way into a position to screw others around them.

I don't think anyone likes the type of people who take advantage of others for personal gain.

I don't disagree; if they're not adding value, they're worthless and extracting wealth from the transaction.